


Iron Rises

by Anarchyinplasma



Series: Life and Times of a Risen [4]
Category: Destiny (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, More of this stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-01
Updated: 2017-03-01
Packaged: 2018-09-27 17:34:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10036406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anarchyinplasma/pseuds/Anarchyinplasma
Summary: Fireteam No Respect For Our Elder get a call up to Felwinter Peak.





	

**Author's Note:**

> So I've had this and a few other pieces sitting about for a while now, decided to post this one, might post the others later.

Fighting through the Fallen on the grind up Felwinter Peak was not an experience that Arcturus wished to repeat. Waves upon waves of the alien menace flinging themselves into his sights with apparently the sole purpose of making his trigger finger hurt too much to carry on, or failing that, to expend his entire pool of ammunition. They had actually succeeded on that last front, First Curse was completely out of power cells, and even Weyloran’s March, a rifle named for an old friend, was running low. He’d almost had to resort to his fallback plan. Almost.

Thankfully, Stratos and Copperwing had seen fit to join him halfway up the mountain, completing the first half of the fireteam. Where the others were, he had no idea, but Lord Saladin Forge had requested all of No Respect For Our Elder and simply told Arcturus that “he knew where to go”, and to “hand out the coordinates”; and he did, though if it turned out that Saladin was in fact not at the top of the peak, he might not be able to resist going back to his old risen ways and dispensing some outlaw justice.

After many trials and tribulations, Copperwing swept brazenly into the abandoned hub of a ski-car with his guard down, only to find it occupied by a rather rowdy knot of Fallen, who wasted no time in relieving the warlock of his arms. Arcturus and Stratos followed soon after, and once the Fallen had more bullets in them than internal organs, Copperwing was revived. He came back shivering and checking both his arms for reassurance. Arcturus scoffed.  
“Oh walk it off, we’ve all been dead at some point.”

While the guardians bickered among themselves, Stratos’ ghost Axis floated over to the control panel and began to muck about with it. Callahan came to take a look himself and sighed mechanically before beginning to make corrections.  
“No no no, this is really old tech. You have to reconnect everything first and then start powering it, you can’t just brute force it, or it’ll just surge and everything breaks.” Axis gave the ghost equivalent of side eye as he moved away.  
“Have you been here before?” Callahan nodded (or what passed for it as a ghost) as he busied himself with the wiring.  
“A few times, a really, really long time ago. We were the trail end of the era.” If he’d had eyebrows, Axis would have furrowed them at that statement, but he left it alone and let the older ghost do the networking.

Among the guardians, the conversation had turned to other matters.  
“It is freezing up here!” ground Stratos through his teeth as the adrenaline of the fight started to wear off, Arcturus shrugged and kicked his boots against the wall of the car to dislodge the layers of caked on snow before briefly removing his helm and taking a lungful of air. He smiled at the crisp sensation, with the slight acrid sting of Fallen blood on the wind. He juggled his helm between his hands as the cart started to move, savouring the crisp air of Felwinter Peak. It had been many years since he was here.

As Stratos was still complaining about the temperature and Arcturus was taking in the scenery, Callahan, Axis, and Danny (Copperwing was boring) pinged with incoming voice communications. Arcturus pulled his helmet back on as they were all connected to a call. Instantly, Rydiah’s voice greeted them from the ether.  
“Where are you guys? We’re waiting at the top for you.” Before Arcturus could answer he’d taken the other two up the mountain the traditional way, as the rite of passage dictated, Stratos cut in.  
“Is there central heating up there!?” Arcturus could hear the surprise in Rydiah’s voice as she answered,  
“Uh, no, it’s the top of a mountain. There’s a big fire pit-” she was cut of as Stratos cheered, Arcturus smirked and counted to three in his head. “But,” Rydiah cut in at the interruption, “there’s no fire and no fuel.” Stratos swore and Arcturus laughed before commenting.  
“Sweep the top layer of ash off and you’ll find fresh logs, then you can rip the fusing mechanism out of a spare grenade and coax a fire from that. Or, if you’re lazy, you can use your light.” He’d barely finished the sentence before a great clang of metal meeting metal sounded, followed by a colossal explosion. Arcturus waited a beat. A gruff voice broke the silence in the comm channel.  
“Fire’s lit.”

Arcturus sighed.  
“Did you guys just fly right to the top? Cause you kinda missed a whole rite of passage, as well as Copperwing losing both his arms.” A disgruntled squeak came from the exo over a reminder of his traumatic experience. The cart lurched to a stop at the top of the mountain, and Arcturus stepped out, followed by his companions, he tuned back into the fireteam frequency.  
“Are there any Fallen at the top?” he queried, wary of yet more knife fights and dodging energy rifles. The reply assuaged his worries somewhat. “No, no Fallen,” Arcturus sighed in relief “apart from one.” the worries previously assuaged returned with a vengeance.  
“What Fallen have you guys not already killed, are you keeping a pet Dreg?”

Background blasts of laser fire cut off any communication as the first half of No Respect began to sprint up the mountain to meet up with the second half. As they neared the Iron Gates, Arcturus got his first look at the prime servitor hovering around the peak. At the same time, Lord Saladin’s voice entered the frequency.  
“Kill Sepiks Guardians! Kill it!” With near perfect timing Germanicus executed a running leap out of the pillars as the servitor continued to shell the front of the Iron temple. Stratos threw open the Iron gates and the first half of No Respect stormed through the gap and across the rickety wooden bridge. Stratos dove to the side as Copperwing fired towards the servitor, sending rounds hurtling it’s way from a pulse rifle with seemingly limitless ammunition. Arcturus drew his bow.

Talons of void energy crawled down his veins, crystallizing in an amethyst bow in his hands. He drew one arrow, letting the void feed on the blood of the earlier fight up the mountain, his bow pulsed in his hands as he let the first arrow fly. The burning lance slammed into Sepiks, and Arcturus drew another, firing again and hitting the same spot on the side plating. Cracks started to spiderweb from the damaged panel and a disparate red-ish glow emerged from beneath the buckling plate. Arcturus transferred his final arrow from his bow hand to his drawing hand, about to draw, when Copperwing’s nova bomb connected with the already damaged side panel.

The plating shattered into a million onyx pieces on the wind, revealing a nest of ugly, pulsing red wires. Sepiks drew away with a mechanical screech and disappeared in a storm of red light. Arcturus let his bow fade, but kept the arrow, twirling it idly on his fingers as he started towards the steps and heard the screaming of old and slightly badly maintained ship engines. Lord Saladin Forge had returned to the Iron Temple.

The old titan transmatted down, and even from his position ascending the steps Arcturus could tell two things. One, Saladin had lost none of his imposing figure and military stature that commanded respect, and two, that even with the crisis, his flare for the dramatic was still intact. A heavy machine gun was raised and two short bursts rang out, killing the final two vandals, which had been hidden behind two pillars at the temple entrance. Saladin’s grizzled voice also graced the Iron Temple for the first time in many years.  
“Even old wolves still bite.”

Unable to resist, Stratos gave Arcturus a shit-eating grin and started to make a crack about his age. Arcturus decked him.


End file.
